In the Kitchen: Chicken Hekka

I'm so happy to post another In the Kitchen segment! To be honest, I'm not sure how often this section will be updated as I suck at cooking. Sometime last month, I attempted to make a carbonara with a recipe I found in the newspaper. It didn't turn out that well lol. Luckily, I found this recipe in the Today section in the Honolulu Star Advitiser either before or after the carbonara failure and this came out pretty well!

Chicken hekka is basically a "whatever's available" type of dish. Similar to a sukiyaki, it is a meat dish mixed with veggies such as watercress, noodles, bamboo, etc. This dish originally calls for chicken, but pork or beef can be used as a substitute. Also, a lot of the veggies can be substituted for other such as choi sum or another leafy green. Here are the original ingredients:

Ingredients

1/4 cup shoyu (soy sauce)
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons mirin or sake
8 ounces boneless chicken thigh or breast, cut into bite-size pieces
1 tablespoon cooking oil
1 onion, thinly sliced
1 carrot, sliced or julienned
4 cups watercress, cut into 2-inch lengths
8-10 shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
3/4 cup sliced bamboo shoots
1 (7-ounce) package shirataki (yam noodles)
20 ounces firm tofu, drained and cut into cubes
8 stalks green onion, cut into 2-ince lengths

First, you mix the shoyu, sugar, and mirin in a small bowl. Then in a different bowl, marinate the chicken with 2 tablespoons of the liquid mixture for at least 10 minutes. Heat a large skillet or wok on high and add the oil. When the oil is hot, add the chicken and onions and sear for 3 minutes. Add the remaining sauce and bring to a boil. Next, add in the carrots, watercress, mushrooms, and bamboo shoots. Cook for another 2 minutes while tossing and turning ingredients. Add the shirataki and tofu to gently combine and cook for another 2 minutes. Lastly, add the green onions and mix. After that, serve it over hot rice and you're finished!

Here are the results:

My review of this recipe is that it's a pretty easy dish to make. I did make the mistake of adding too much green onions. I thought that 8 stalks of green onion meant 1 bunch so it turned out a little too green oniony hehe. Also, I would add a little more shoyu because I think the taste needed to be a tad bit stronger. The sauce is only the shoyu, sugar, and mirin and I don't think 1/4 cup of shoyu cuts it for the amount of ingredients in this recipe. But hey, that's my opinion. If you want a light, fresh taste, keep to the original amount, but if you want it more savory, I say increase the amount of shoyu.

I hope you try out this recipe! It's kind of representative of the local food here in Hawaii. It's very typical to eat this at home. I love it because of the mix of veggies and the use of lean meat, like chicken. If I find anymore recipes in the newspaper that are worthy (and successfully made on my part lol), I'll be sure to post it!

Thanks for reading!
-LAUREN